Poof! Snooki magically appears in serious publications

Including Jersey Shore personality Snooki in a discussion of taxation might seemed like something that would appeal only to media figures with less credibility to maintain, but as of August 2 Snooki's -- ahem -- skin-deep political analysis had made its way into Bloomberg's Businessweek.

Since Snooki stated that she no longer uses tanning beds "because Obama put a 10 percent tax on tanning" and asserted that "McCain would never put a 10 percent tax on tanning," a variety of conservatives have reveled in her comments. Fox Business' America's Nightly Scoreboard used her comments as a launching point for a discussion on the tanning tax, during which crazy person[1] Pamela Geller insisted[2] that Snooki "should be news because she's the common man" and claimed that the tax illustrates Obama's "contempt for the little guy." Snooki's taxation criticism also graced[3] a headline at Hugh Hewitt's blog, was the subject of a post[4] on Andrew Breitbart's Big Hollywood, and ended up[5] on Fox Nation.

Fox, Pamela Geller, Breitbart and Hugh Hewitt might be expected to use Snooki's outraged complaints about melanin depravation to attack Obama and his policies. But Businessweek? In an article titled "Snooki Tanning-Bed Protest Splits Sin From Taxes," favored[6] economist of the right Amity Shlaes writes[7]:

Snookered by Snooki. That's what President Barack Obama probably felt after the reality TV celebrity introduced race into the discussion of a new tax on tanning.

"McCain would never put a 10 percent tax on tanning," the "Jersey Shore" star, whose real name is Nicole Polizzi, said of the man who lost the election to Obama. "Because he's pale and would probably want to be tan."

Once again, Obama found himself on the defensive about a racial matter.

Snooki managed to put her browned finger on an important weakness plaguing all of Washington. Call it tax sanctimony. Presidents and lawmakers demonstrate this condition when they link a tax to a social purpose. This pairing is disingenuous, wastes political energy and, in the long run, actually deprives federal coffers of needed revenue.